Prominent Blacks Meet to Search For an Answer to Mounting Crime

With their communities so ravaged by crime that even people like the Rev. Jesse Jackson are saying they sometimes fear encountering young black men on the street, a group of black politicians, sociologists, ministers, celebrities and civil rights leaders met today in what some acknowledge is an increasingly desperate search for answers.

While they agreed that the problem was rapidly spinning out of control, they condemned the solution most often offered to deal with it: stiffer prison sentences and more jail cells. 'It's an Uphill Struggle'

"We've got to take the initiative, even if it's an uphill struggle, to move government and the country away from this simplistic approach to the crime problem," Representative John Conyers Jr., Democrat of Michigan, said at the conference, which was organized by Mr. Jackson.

The hard-line method is embodied in the crime bill recently passed by the Senate. Participants at the conference, including members of the Congressional Black Caucus, vowed to fight it when the House takes up the measure later this month.

The measure, which has the backing of the Clinton Administration, calls for mandatory minimum prison sentences for certain violent crimes, the construction of more jails, restrictions on death row appeals and permission for prosecutors to charge juveniles as adults for certain Federal crimes. In a marriage of liberal and conservative views on preventing crime, it would also ban certain models of assault weapons and provide money to hire 100,000 more police officers to patrol the nation's streets.

But many conference participants argued that increasing prison sentences and building more jails will not solve the crime problem. They contend that the prison population has nearly tripled since 1980 and yet the crime rate, particularly in black neighborhoods, has continued to rise and that the rate at which people are victimized by criminals is growing four times as fast among blacks as among whites.

Still, even staunch opponents acknowledged that it would be difficult to derail the measure, which aims to spend $22.3 billion over five years on anti-crime efforts. Big Issue Among Blacks

Nonetheless, conference participants say they intend to back an alternative measure drafted by the Congressional Black Caucus. That bill directs more money into crime-prevention programs, drug treatment and job creation.

"This is a very important conference," said Representative Don Edwards, Democrat of California. "It is the opening shot in one of the great battles we're going to have, not only in 1994, but in the coming decade."

There is growing evidence that crime is becoming an important political and social issue among blacks. In a New York Times/CBS News poll conducted in November, 28 percent of the black respondents, twice the percentage of whites, placed crime and violence as the most important problem facing the country. Last January only 8 percent of black respondents in a similar poll felt that way.

Violence, crime and who best can handle it were also important issues in last year's Mayoral race in Detroit and are expected to be important issues in this year's race in Washington. Both cities have black majorities.

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"Crime as an issue spilled off the page in any poll you take," said David Axelrod, who was the media adviser for Dennis Archer, the winning candidate in the Detroit race. "In any poll you do today, crime is the No. 1 issue."

The increasing concern by blacks about crime reflects the sharp increase in the rate of crime affecting them. According to the Bureau of Criminal Justice Statistics, the number of violent crimes, excluding murder, in which blacks were the victims increased 42 percent from 1980 to 1992, the last year for which this statistic is available. During the same time, the increase for violent crimes in which whites were the victims rose 9 percent.

The figures also indicate that for crimes like murder, rape, robbery and assault, the race of the offender and the victim are the same in an overwhelming majority of the cases. Violence Seems Normal

Black-on-black crime has become so pervasive, Mr. Jackson said at a news conference here today, that "we have come to accept it as normal." During the conference, Mr. Jackson noted that there had been four shootings near his home in Washington in recent months.

But if the conference illuminates an emerging consensus among blacks on the importance of crime, it also provides stark evidence that a meeting of the minds on the solutions may be difficult to reach.

For example, in the conference's opening panel on Thursday night, on violence against women, C. Delores Tucker, head of the National Political Congress of Black Women, said misogynist and inflammatory lyrics of some rap music was provoking abuse against black women. She said her group would be picketing records stores that sold such music.

Ms. Tucker was immediately warned by Laura Murphy-Lee, director of the Washington chapter of the American Civil Liberties Union, that blacks should be careful not to align themselves with right-wing groups that advocate censorship. And a number of people in the audience, including teen-agers and college students, said that rap music did not cause violence but simply mirrored the experience of many youths in the inner city. Debate on Young Criminals

And while several attending the conference condemned the provision in the Senate bill that allows juveniles to be charged as adults for certain crimes, that amendment was sponsored by Senator Carol Moseley-Braun, Democrat of Illinois, the lone black in the Senate.

"Everything we see in the black community right now is on the level of exhortation," said Milton Morris, vice president of the Joint Center for Political and Economic Studies, which researches black-oriented issues.

"But in terms of what do we do in policies, strategies and programs, I don't see anything yet," he added. "And the truth is it's tough and difficult to find solutions. All the solutions before us are either Draconian, prison-oriented types of measures or the kind of costly long-term violence prevention efforts that I don't think the society right now has the patience or the will to take on."

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A version of this article appears in print on January 8, 1994, on Page 1001001 of the National edition with the headline: Prominent Blacks Meet to Search For an Answer to Mounting Crime. Order Reprints|Today's Paper|Subscribe